The World; A Chance to Give Evil Its Rewards

By JANE PERLEZ

Published: May 21, 2000

WASHINGTON—
FODAY SANKOH, the Sierra Leone warlord whose thugs made a tactic of hacking off the hands and limbs of children and others, ended the week a prisoner under the guard of British soldiers, but that is just the beginning of the story for the rest of the world.

Will other nations now insist he be brought to justice? Or will there be another diplomatic pact with him, forged for a short-term goal of pacifying his troops?

Here, then, is a stark situation that may compel democracies to answer a bitter question that haunted most of the last century: How much business can good guys afford to do with bad guys?

The oft-expressed presumption in democratic societies these days is that strongmen who inflict terrible crimes, whether on their neighbors or on their own people, should pay for their wrongdoing. But the reality has not been so simple. As the 1990's spawned warlords from Yugoslavia to Haiti, from Cambodia to Africa, the principle was often sacrificed to the pragmatic goal of striking peace deals, no matter how shaky.

''Diplomats look to the short term, they tend to think any agreement is good,'' said Morton I. Abramowitz, a veteran American envoy. ''Diplomats like to export problems to the future.''

Even in Mr. Sankoh's case, there are divisions in the Clinton administration. While some officials argue strongly for bringing the warlord to justice, others seem to believe that he still may have a role to play in the evolving efforts to bring peace to Sierra Leone -- or at least in freeing United Nations peacekeepers whom Mr. Sankoh's rebels have taken hostage. The Administration's envoy, the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who is in the region now, is on good terms with Mr. Sankoh's companion warlord, President Charles Taylor of Liberia, and Sierra Leone officials have criticized him for suggesting -- before Mr. Sankoh was detained -- that the he be included in reconciliation efforts.

What might be the logic of that? Consider past experience. In Haiti, there was clear benefit when an American-brokered deal allowed a strongman, Gen. Raoul Cedras, to go into exile in exchange for a peaceful landing of American troops sent to restore President Jean-Bertrand Aristide to power.

In the former Yugoslavia, the benefits were not so clear. In 1994, Western powers dealt with the Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic even though they knew he was responsible for war crimes in the Balkans. His value as a guarantor of the Dayton peace accords was considered more vital than serving justice, and the accords did stop the killing in Bosnia. But they also left Mr. Milosevic in a position to start the next war, in Kosovo. Only during that war was he finally indicted by the United Nations tribunal for Balkan war crimes. And he still remains in power.

Will a pact be made with Mr. Sankoh? In the end, probably not, most diplomats think. His crimes are too egregious and public outrage too intense. But the possibility cannot be dismissed.

Just days before Mr. Sankoh broke the Lome accord for peace in Sierra Leone, an agreement that had granted him an amnesty and a strong position in the Sierra Leone government, Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright spoke as though another deal with any such warlord could not be imagined. She told a conference on war crimes: ''We have to keep our eye on the prize: justice for the perpetrators of genocide and crimes against humanity.''

But last week, faced with the collapse of United Nations peacekeeping operations and another hellish descent into war in Sierra Leone, the State Department sounded a different note. Richard Boucher, the department's spokesman, repeatedly evaded questions about whether Mr. Sankoh was a candidate for trial as a war criminal. Part of the reason was concern for the safety of several hundred United Nations peacekeepers who remain hostages of Mr. Sankoh's rebels. In other words, the rebels can still create havoc, and Mr. Sankoh's presumed power to control that group, the R.U.F., remains a bargaining chip -- just as Mr. Milosevic's power to fix problems he had created was his strongest card in Dayton.

Still, diplomats this time appear to be shrinking from dealing with Mr. Sankoh, partly because of the nature of his crimes and partly because he has such a bad record of keeping peace bargains he has made.

''You have all the reasons to prosecute firmly established,'' said Diane Orentlicher, professor of law and director of the war crimes research office at Washington University. ''There is no doubt that the R.U.F. committed atrocious war crimes and violated international law. There is no question that Sankoh is not useful as a peacemaker. And he's in custody.''

Ms. Orentlicher says there are a number of ways Mr. Sankoh could be prosecuted -- either in Sierra Leone, in a foreign country or, less likely, by a new United Nations war crimes tribunal for Sierra Leone. ''One of the most remarkable developments in recent years has been the willingness of states to explore novel mechanisms to ensure accountability,'' she said.

One of the most celebrated such approaches was called to mind by the fact that Mr. Sankoh was being guarded by soldiers from Britain, whose courts ruled that Gen. Augusto Pinochet could be extradited to Spain to face trial for crimes committed in Chile.

ONE of Britain's most prominent barristers, Geoffrey Robertson, argued last week that a prosecution of Mr. Sankoh in Britain would be a natural followup to the Pinochet case. Because Mr. Sankoh was now effectively in British hands, Mr. Robertson said, ''Pinochet has opened the door to a Sankoh trial -- this is the challenge that human rights law now throws down to the diplomats.'' It should be remembered, though, that in the Pinochet case, Britain's legal authorities were more enthusiastic about allowing extradition than was the British government, which would have had to face the political and diplomatic consequences. And now, the government of Prime Minister Tony Blair has yet to show any enthusiasm for hauling Mr. Sankoh into the Old Bailey for trial.

Photo: Mutilation of civilians like these children has been a hallmark tactic of the rebels in Sierra Leone who are led by Foday Sankoh. (Associated Press)